Book Breakfast: The House at Sugar Beach, Saturday, 1/31, 11am-12:30pm

The Gottesman Libraries sponsors book talks by faculty, students, staff, and others interested in sharing their work with the Teachers College community. Join us as we celebrate your achievements and promote social and intellectual discourse on key topics of relevance to the educating, psychological and health professions.

• An American Insurrection, Wednesday, 1/28, 4-6pm


In light of upcoming Black History Month, William Doyle will speak on his publication, An American Insurrection: James Meredith and the Battle of Oxford, Mississippi, 1962 (Doubleday, 2001). His book recounts the story of air force veteran James Meredith who tried to become the first black student to register at the University of Mississippi. The act led to a revolt that resulted in a fourteen-hour battle, with invasion by 30,000 combat troops ordered in by President John F. Kennedy. Meredith was physically blocked by Governor Ross Barnett, hundreds of state police, and thousands of student and civilian "volunteers" from across the South, resulting in a "constitutional crisis" in the unfolding struggle for civil rights.

William Doyle's previous book, Inside the Oval Office: The White House Tapes from FDR to Clinton (1999) was a New York Times Notable Book. In 1998 he won the Writers Guild of America Award for Best TV Documentary for the A&E special The Secret White House Tapes, which he co-wrote and co-produced. Doyle's awards include the ALA Alex Award (Winner, 2002); American Bar Association Silver Gavel Award (Winner, 2002); and the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award (Finalist 2002). Doyle is partnering with a major movie studio on a new film based on An American Insurrection.

See the recorded talk or on i-tunes.

Where: 305 Russell


• Facts on the Ground, Friday, 1/30, 11am-12:30pm


In recent weeks, rigorous debate has sparked the TC community over the announcement of The President's Grant for Diversity and Community Initiatives in which an award was given to the Society for Anthropological Studies for its theme, "Inclusion, Collaboration, and Engagement"; among other venues, SAS had invited Nadia Abu El-Haj to lecture on the subject of her critically acclaimed, though highly controversial book, Facts on the Ground: Archaeological Practice and Territorial Self-Fashioning in Israeli Society (University of Chicago, 2001). Although Dr. El-Haj declined the invitation to speak, a book breakfast will be held on Friday, January 30th to explore key issues in the book and the questions and concerns voiced by faculty, students, and staff.

Facts on the Ground is based on Abu El-Haj's doctoral dissertation from Duke University; Nadia Abu El-Haj, recently tenured as Associate Professor of Anthropology at Barnard College, investigates Israeli archaeological practices, as they are contextualized by nationalist identity formation in the relatively new state of Israel. As stated in her introduction Abu El-Haj rejects "positivist commitment to scientific methods" in favor of a methodology rooted in "post-structuralism, philosophical critiques of foundationalism, Marxism, and critical theory" and "developed in response to specific postcolonial political movements."

Many readers perceive Abu El-Haj's work as denunciation of the state of Israel with Anti-Zion bias; a "demonization"; and denial of Hebrew kingdoms in ancient Israel; others view the publication as a fresh approach to the teaching of anthropology, with many questions unanswered, left to be explored. In the words of Katie Keenan, President of the Society for Anthropological Studies, "There are opinions that challenge us, and encourage us to question our own assumptions."

Nadia Abu El-Haj won the Middle East Studies Association's Albert Hourani Annual Book Award in 2002. Prior to joining Barnard College, she taught at the University of Chicago and has lectured throughout the United Kingdom. Abu El-Haj was a former Fulbright scholar and recipient of numerous grants and awards, including the SSRC McArthur Grant in International Peace and Security, the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, and the National Endowment for the Humanities. She is also an Associate Editor of The American Ethnologist: A Journal of the American Ethnological Society and serves on the Editorial Collective of Public Culture.

This book breakfast is co-sponsored by the Teachers College Society for Anthropological Studies, The President's Office for Community and Diversity Affairs, and the Gottesman Libraries. In the absence of the author, all members of the community are invited to engage in academic inquiry and incorporate their views on how we can continue to engage in educational reform, both here and within the broader field of development and education.

Where: Second Floor Salon


• The House at Sugar Beach: In Search of a Lost African Childhood, Saturday, 1/31, 11am-12:30pm


In The House at Sugar Beach, Helene Cooper recounts her childhood in war-torn Liberia and vivid reunion with a foster sister who had been left behind when her family fled West Africa. Cooper's stunning memoir explores the Liberian coup of 1980 and its effect on the author’s family, recognized socially and politically-elite descendants of American freed slaves who colonized the country in the nineteenth century.

Helene Cooper has been a diplomatic correspondent for The New York Times, based in Washington since 2006. Cooper joined the company in 2004 as an assistant editorial page editor. She also wrote prolifically on trade, politics, race, and foreign policy for The Wall Street Journal and served as a reporter on international economics. For an overview by Helene Cooper of The House at Sugar Beach please visit her video at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vbZI3fbTC8.

This book breakfast is co-sponsored by the Gottesman Libraries and the African Studies Working Group, who will lead the discussion in the author's absence.

Where: Second Floor Salon